The use of high-frequency electromagnetic energy as a means of heating polymers is an advancing art which finds application in many fields, especially in fields in which conventional conductive, convective, or radiant heat energy is either not suitable, not practical, or not possible. For instance, sealing of a polymer to itself or to some other substrate can be (if the composition of the polymer is appropriate) an important commercial technique in producing a desired end-product.
There are some polymers which are not suitable, or at least not well-suited, for high-frequency heating operations. In such ill-suited polymers high-frequency heating either does not occur, or if it occurs it does so only after inefficiently prolonged periods of treatment time. In production assembly lines, e.g., a quick heat-seal operation is generally preferred over a prolonged heat-seal operation.
Among the polymers which are ill-suited for high-frequency heating are olefin polymers, e.g., polymers and copolymers of ethylene, propylene, styrene or other .alpha.-olefinically unsaturated hydrocarbons having about 2 to about 10 carbon atoms. Some of these olefin polymers may contain polar groups, or polarizable groups, due to the incorporation therein of, e.g., acrylic (or methacrylic) acids or their alkyl esters as comonomers with the olefins, and these groups may, at high levels of incorporation tend to impart a modicum of high-frequency heatability to the polymer, but the efficacy is generally so slight that it is infeasible on a commercial basis. Some polymers having polar groups, e.g. chlorinated P.E., ethylene/vinyl acetate copolymer, PVC, polyvinylidene chloride, and polyamide, are heatable under the influence of certain frequencies of electromagnetic radiation, but are not generally wellsuited for bonding using the higher frequencies.
Polyethylene is particularly known in the art to be substantially unsuitable for high-frequency heating unless sensitizers are added to the polymer; this is true regardless of whether it is linear or branched, or of whether it is low, medium, or high density (see, e.g., U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,336,173; 3,640,913; and 3,810,799).
There are various types of packaging containers which are substantially closed except for a filling-opening and which can be sealed by pinching the filling-opening to a closed position and providing a means for keeping it closed. This includes such containers as open-top bags, bags with pinch-valves, open-end tubes, and the like. Usually such containers are of multi-ply construction, at least in the area which is pinched shut after being filled.
It is an object of the present invention to provide ways and means for imparting high-frequency heatability to the pinch area of open-mouth containers (or bags), valve bags, and the like which have a filling-opening which is pinched shut after the container is filled and fastened in the closed condition.